something bigger than us (and beyond bliss)
by shineyma
Summary: Grant comes home from a six-month long op to find that Jemma made a new friend in his absence. He is not pleased. (HYDRA AU)


A/N: This is not smut, but it's definitely the closest I've ever gotten to writing it. Warnings for semi-graphic foreplay, Dom/sub undertones, and Ward being a creepy, possessive jerk. (Also warnings for Jemma really enjoying that last one.)

Apologies to therearenostringsonme-steveslogs, whose prompt (A biospecialist hyrda fic/oneshot where Ward is jealous of Simmons seemingly getting close to Bakshi) inspired this. I'm pretty sure this is not at all what they meant.

Also I owe a lot of review responses but they will not be happening today because this fic is so far out of my comfort zone that I need to go hide for a year or two until I get over my embarrassment.

Title from "Love Me Harder" by Ariana Grande and The Weeknd.

Thanks for reading and please be very, very gentle if you review.

* * *

Grant is always quiet when he comes back from assignment. It doesn't matter what sort—infiltration, information-gathering, elimination, seduction, some combination of the above—whenever he gets back, he is quiet. He speaks little, if at all, and every movement is deliberate, no step or gesture wasted. Even in his most relaxed moments he is stealthy, but when fresh from a mission, he becomes a ghost. He appears and disappears, leaving no sign of his passage, and scares the life out of Jemma every time he does it.

She's not entirely certain what causes it. She wonders about it sometimes—whether it's because doing what he does requires that he shut a part of himself off, or if he spends the whole time he's away locked inside his head, or if it's simply his way of adjusting from the constant danger of the field to the relative safety of the HYDRA compound. There's really no way of knowing.

She supposes it doesn't truly matter.

In addition to being quiet, he's also more blatantly lethal. Not to say he is ever _not_ lethal, but in the wake of his assignments he becomes even more so. If every move is deliberate it is also threatening, and she has seen hardened specialists go pale at nothing more than a single glance from Grant in the immediate aftermath of a mission.

_That_ is less of a mystery, though no less worrying. In a way, though, it's almost irrelevant. Jemma knows she has nothing to fear from him.

The point is, Grant is quiet and dangerous when he comes back, but never for long. He will appear without warning at her side and draw her away from her work without so much as a hello, scare away any lab partners or assistants or supervisors who might object with nothing more than a raised eyebrow, and then lead her to their quarters. There, he uses her—and there is no other applicable term by which to describe their post-mission sex—to wash away the remnants of his most recent assignment: to work through the adrenaline crash, to draw himself out of his own mind, whatever.

When it's over, when they're both spent and breathless, tangled together on whichever flat surface serves on any given occasion (it's hardly ever the bed, in the wake of his assignments), he's back to normal: arrogant and sarcastic in all the best ways, his off-putting silence ended until the next time he comes home and the sheer lethality of him tucked away behind a slightly more civilized veneer.

Sometimes, if the mission has been particularly trying and the sex has been accordingly—overly—rough, he will apologize, with soft words and soft kisses and a tenderness he reserves solely for her. Most times, however, he doesn't bother, and she appreciates that even more than she does the tenderness. Jemma is not fragile and she is not delicate; she is not only able but _happy_ to bear the burdens he carries home with him, and she would be more than offended if he turned to other means to lighten them.

From the very first time it happens, she's pleased to help him recover from his missions and touched that he trusts her enough to let her. She realizes the significance of it, lets it warm her and encourage her (she is the first one, between them, to say _I love you_, but he _shows_ it long before she opens her mouth), at once.

It takes her far longer to realize the _importance_ of it, however.

Generally speaking, very little time passes between Grant appearing in her lab and stripping her clothes off in their front hall. She doesn't really have the opportunity to speak with him, and though she does of course observe him (as a scientist, she can hardly help it), her attention is—inevitably—somewhat split: between her worry for him and her relief at his safe return and the other indescribable multitude of feelings the very sight of him induces in her.

Which is to say, they don't truly, meaningfully interact until he's got her clothes off.

He's so quiet in his post-mission state that conversation is essentially impossible. As, of course, is quarreling. Her knowledge of the difference between Grant post-mission and Grant every other time is mostly academic: she's aware of it, but only through distracted observation and the notable contrast between post-mission sex and the other sex they have.

She _knows_ he's different when he gets home. She can enumerate the ways.

But she doesn't realize precisely _how_ different he is until the day he comes home and finds Sunil Bakshi in her lab with her.

x

Grant has been away for nearly six months, on a highly classified assignment about which she knows exactly nothing. She's used to his absences, and it's not the longest he's ever been gone, but it's certainly been the most _difficult_ absence, to date. Mainly because Fitz was called away three weeks in to oversee testing on one of his solo projects, and she hasn't seen _him_ since, either.

For all of her quirks, Jemma really is a social person, and it's been a lonely few months. It's only natural that she would seek companionship elsewhere, in the absence of both her lover and her best friend.

Enter one Sunil Bakshi, who originally dropped by her lab to interrogate her about a series of experiments she had planned, ended up staying long enough to share a cup of tea with her, and eventually (somehow) became a regular fixture during the workday. He's made a habit of hanging about, using Fitz's empty workstation as a desk from which to work while she's busy and offering companionship and conversation when she isn't.

She likes him. She's entertained by his dry wit and cutting sense of humor, fascinated by the stories he shares of his brief time in the field, and impressed by the questions he asks about her work. Additionally, they share a similar weakness for British panel shows which means that, for the first time since uni, she actually has someone to watch them with.

They're discussing the most recent episode of _Would I Lie to You_ (or, to be more precise, debating the relative merits of David Mitchell and Lee Mack) when the air in the lab—for lack of a better term—suddenly _shifts_. Sunil stills, one of her lab assistants drops a (thankfully empty) beaker, and Jemma whirls around to find Grant standing in the doorway.

"You're home!" she says delightedly. He looks mostly unharmed, too, which is both lovely and unusual. "Welcome back!"

He nods once, in acknowledgement, but makes no move to actually enter the lab. His eyes sweep over her three lab assistants—all desperately trying not to make eye contact; she's never had an assistant last longer than four months because they're all scared to death of Grant—linger on Fitz's empty workstation, and then settle on Sunil. He takes a casual step away from her. Grant's eyes follow him.

Right. First things first.

"I think we're done for the day," she says to her lab assistants. She darts a glance at Grant, considers how long he's been away, and adds, "And you can take the rest of the week, as well. Just make sure someone comes in to rotate the specimens in the Ophiuchus project on schedule, please."

She gets a vaguely affirmative murmur from Nina, a distracted wave from Lorenzo, and a terrified squeak from Owen before all three of them disappear through the side door. Lorenzo doesn't even stop to pick up his mobile (left charging on an empty bit of counter).

She sighs. Sunil (poorly) stifles a chuckle.

"Shall I arrange interviews for new assistants later in the month?" he offers.

"Probably," she says. "But I'll live in hope. Make it next month instead."

"As you say," he agrees, with a touch of his elegant skepticism. Jemma smiles despite herself.

Grant is still in the doorway, which is unusual. Typically he enters the lab at once, regardless of who else might be present. But then, she doesn't typically have members of HYDRA's upper management in her lab.

"If there's nothing else?" she prompts Sunil gently.

"No," he says, and smiles knowingly. "Until next week, then, Jemma." He gives Grant a nod. "Welcome back, Mr. Ward."

Like her assistants, he exits through the side door that leads to the stairwell, rather than attempting to pass by Grant. Unlike them, he takes his time about it, moving at a casual stroll rather than a near-run. Shaking her head fondly, she takes a moment to save her work (fortunately, she's only working on a proposal and some long-term experiments at the moment; nothing that will suffer for her absence if she spends the rest of the week locked up with Grant, as she fully intends to) and log off of her computer.

That complete, she turns away from her computer—only to jump when she finds Grant standing directly behind her.

"Grant!" she scolds. "_How_ many times do I have to ask you to make a bit of noise when you do that?"

She's not truly expecting a response, of course, which is why she nearly jumps again when she gets one.

"Jemma," he says, and she spends several long seconds staring at him expectantly before she realizes that rather than requesting her attention, he's asking (in his post-mission laconic way) about Sunil's use of her first name.

"Yes," she says. "We've become very good friends during your absence."

"Have you," Grant says—doesn't ask—mildly, and Jemma feels…something.

It's not fear—she _knows_ she's in no danger from Grant—but it's something like it: a curious thrill that sets her heart to racing, sudden and unexpected.

He's jealous, she realizes, and isn't certain why it shocks her so. Grant is nothing if not possessive, and he's never made a secret of it. From the very first days of their relationship, when he made their changed status clear to any who looked—by a hand lingering in the small of her back, by love bites left along her throat, high enough that no collar could hide them, by a pointed glare at the lab assistant who always stared at her breasts when he brought her the samples she requested—it was blatantly obvious that he's the type of lover who feels a sort of ownership over his partner.

It doesn't particularly bother her. It never has, really—she likes that he cares enough, that he's _invested_ enough, to feel the need to ensure that people know they're together. She enjoys the effect she has on him: Grant Ward, self-assured and lethal, one of HYDRA's best specialists, reduced to school-boy posturing over a (relatively) harmless biochemist.

It bothers Fitz, or used to—_what if you change your mind_, he asked, back at the beginning, _what if you decide you don't want him any longer and he won't let you go_; but that's what poisons are for, isn't it?—but it's never bothered her.

It's never worried her, either, but now—staring up at him with her mouth gone dry and heartbeat suddenly tripled—it occurs to her that that might have been a miscalculation on her part. Grant is no threat to her and she knows it, but Sunil has no such assurance, and the look on Grant's face right now promises bloodshed so clearly that even a child could read it.

"Grant," she says, carefully, and hesitates.

She has no idea how to handle this. He's a possessive lover, yes, but he's never been truly _jealous_ before. She's seen him scare away waiters whose eyes linger, lab assistants who become too familiar—even a superior officer, once or twice, and he can get away with _that_ because everyone is utterly terrified of him (and for good reason)—but it's never been over anyone real, anyone _permanent_.

Even Fitz, who has been a source of jealousy in literally every other romantic relationship she's ever had, has never provoked this reaction. She imagines it's because Grant was already familiar with the two of them before he started dating her; he knew the way of them, knew that there was no chance of anything there, ever, whether he was in the picture or not.

But, somehow, Sunil has tripped his instincts, and she's no idea how to disarm them. Especially not when he's like this, in his post-mission difference. Any other time, she thinks a joke would work—yes, a joke followed by scorn at the very _idea_ that she would look at someone else—but something tells her that it would be the wrong course to take with this version of Grant.

Which leaves her with…precisely nothing.

"Grant," she repeats. He's watching her with flat eyes, evaluating, and she licks her lips. "You're being absurd."

"Am I?" he asks pleasantly.

"You are," she affirms. "Sunil—"

And that's a mistake, she thinks as soon as she's said it. She should have called him Bakshi, been less familiar—wasn't it his own familiarity that sparked this in the first place?—but it's too late now, and all she can do is continue.

"—and I are friends," she insists. "That's all."

She wants to add something more, perhaps about how insulting it is that he's (silently) accusing her of infidelity—that he doubts her commitment to him—but she doesn't quite dare. She doesn't fear for her own well-being, but she's frightened to death of Sunil's chances.

Jemma doesn't care about many people. Somewhere along the line of the last few months, Sunil has become the most recent entry on a very short list. She doesn't want him dead—not on her account. Not on any account.

"That looked like more than friends to me," Grant says.

"Then you need your eyes checked," she counters, and is annoyed by how oddly flustered she sounds. She _hates_ being off-balance. "I am no more romantic with Su—him than I am with Fitz."

His eyes narrow. "Then maybe I should take another look at Fitz."

She groans, frustrated, and starts to push away from her workstation—because her heart is still racing and her knees are beginning to feel a touch weak; if they're going to be going in circles about this, she'd like to do so sitting down—but doesn't make it far. Grant's hand closes around her upper arm, grip not at all painful but firm enough that she knows she won't be able to pull away, and it stops her mid-step.

"Where do you think you're going?" he asks, and his tone sends another thrill of that not-quite-fear through her.

"To sit down," she says—doesn't quite manage to snap. "You're being ridiculous and I've been on my feet all day."

He says nothing, and she tries to walk away. She makes it all of four steps, because he's still got her arm and, as expected, when she tries to twist out of his grip she fails utterly. The attempt seems to spark something in him, though, and he abandons his eerie stillness and _moves_.

The next thing she knows, she's pinned between Grant and the counter, the edge of it digging uncomfortably into her back and Grant pressed solidly against her front. Her heart picks up even more speed, because she didn't track the movement at all—didn't even see it happen—and that's not a good sign. She still—_always_—believes she's not at risk from Grant, but it's a pointed reminder of just how dangerous he is right now.

(He's _always_ dangerous, of course, but he's magnitudes worse when he's fresh back from an assignment, and it's apparent that he's in no hurry to wind himself down—to let _her_ wind him down.)

She tries to shove him away—to put some space between them so she can _think_—but he doesn't even budge.

She swallows.

Grant doesn't often use his size against her like this. Playfully and during intercourse, yes. Even during the occasional argument. But not like this—with this air of _menace_.

He is so very, very different, and she is so very far out of her depth.

"I could kill him," he murmurs, a dark promise that makes her shudder (from fear or something else). "He's a manager, not an operative. It wouldn't even be a challenge."

"It's not—nothing _happened_, Grant," she says, and he winds his other hand into her hair and _tugs_, sending a sharp shock of not-quite-pain along her scalp. Her breath catches.

"Maybe not," he allows, and the hand on her arm loosens, slides up to and across her shoulder to rest at the curve of her neck. He sweeps his thumb along the column of her throat, brushing over her pulse, and has no visible reaction to the way her heart is (still) racing. "But he's been _looking_."

"He hasn't," she denies, somewhat weakly.

"He has," he says. "He let me catch him at it. Stupid." The hand in her hair tightens, then relaxes, another tug becoming a caress mid-motion, and she fists her hands in the hem of his shirt just to steady herself. "He's been looking and he _wants_ to touch."

It takes her a few tries to speak. She's caught somewhere between terror for Sunil, annoyance at Grant's high-handedness, and a slow, creeping lust, and her head spins with it.

"Maybe," she says, because he's so much better at reading people than she is, and she can't outright deny the possibility. "Maybe he has. But _I_ haven't and I _don't_."

He slides his hand up her neck to grasp her chin, tilting her face up towards him. His jaw ticks as his eyes meet hers for a long moment, searching, and she doesn't try to pull away. Her heart is hammering in her chest and her knees are decidedly weak, but she has nothing to hide. She _doesn't_ want Sunil. He's a friend. Anything more—if indeed there _is_ anything more—is solely on his part.

It's irrelevant that Jemma is terrible at deception. There's no need for it here.

"No," Grant agrees, eventually, and his tone is still dark but the thumb of the hand tangled in her hair is tracing circles behind her ear and the slow, creeping lust is building into a thrumming in her veins, and she's always found his arrogance attractive, so she doesn't even mind when he continues, "You wouldn't dare."

And then he's kissing her, fiercely possessive to a degree he's _never_ been (which is truly saying something), and she forgets fear and annoyance in favor of lust, burning her up from the inside out. His mouth is hot against hers and he tastes like the Scotch Whitehall always offers after a debrief, and it's been _so long _since the last time she kissed him that she almost wants to cry.

She matches him as best she can and tries to move closer, but he's still got her pinned against the counter so all she can do is let go of his shirt to hook her fingers in his belt loops and tug him more firmly against her.

He shifts, slotting one leg between hers, and even she can't classify the noise she makes—whimper or squeak or moan—but it makes him grin against her mouth, and she bites his bottom lip in retaliation. It's his turn to make a noise (definitely a groan), and he breaks away from her with a muttered Russian word she's fairly certain is impolite.

"You don't want him," he says, voice rough, and it sounds more like an order than anything else. She has plenty to say about _that_, but no amount of lust is enough to make her stupid, so she'll save it for a time when a good friend's life _isn't_ hanging in the balance.

"As I've said," she says, breathlessly. "No, I don't." She eyes him warily and decides to risk adding, "So there's no call to kill him."

"Maybe I won't," he says, but his tone is still too dark for her to relax. "Maybe I'll just maim him." His hand, which sometime during their kiss shifted from holding her chin to cupping her jaw, falls to her cardigan, and he slowly undoes the buttons one-handed as he continues, "Gouge his eyes out. Break his fingers. Maybe I'll cut a few of them off." His other hand is still in her hair, thumb tracing circles behind her ear, and it's sending little sparks of desire straight to her core. "Give them to you in a jar, keep it here in the lab so everyone can see _exactly_ what even _thinking_ about touching you will cost them."

He's playing with her. Teasing at undressing her, toying with one of her erogenous zones, still with his thigh pressing intimately against her—and all the while threatening Sunil. Her head is spinning again (if ever it stopped) and she can't think straight. Her thoughts race—from the _want _that's overwhelming her (it's been _months_), to the danger Sunil is in (she still has no idea how to defuse this), and actually she _could_ use a few human fingers (they'd serve as excellent test subjects for SE-009)—and she can't catch her breath and, meanwhile, he's still talking.

"Or maybe I won't gouge his eyes," he considers, and shifts, increasing the pressure of his thigh. "Maybe I'll cut them out, put _them_ in a jar. They'd make an even better warning, wouldn't they?"

She still can't breathe. "Grant—"

"Maybe I'll make _you_ do it," he says, and grins down at her. He's finished unbuttoning her cardigan, and he toys with the top button of the shirt beneath as he asks, "Would you do that, hmm? Perform surgery on your new friend _Sunil_? Take his eyes if it meant saving his life?"

His tone is threatening and seductive and he has _never_ spoken to her this way before. It's terrifying and arousing all at once, and she needs to put a stop to it before she lets it overwhelm her enough to actually _agree_ to what he's proposing.

"He hasn't," she starts, and stutters a bit as he begins unbuttoning her shirt. His knuckles brush against her bare skin and she almost loses her train of thought. "He hasn't done anything. There's no cause for violence."

"He's thought about it," Grant says lightly. "That's enough cause."

"But he hasn't _done_ anything," she insists. He pauses on the third button at her tone. "You were gone for _months_ and he never even hinted towards—towards anything."

"I was gone for months," he echoes, and finally stops tracing those torturous circles, in favor of sliding his hand down to grip the back of her neck. "Are you suggesting that this is my fault? That I've been _neglecting_ you?"

"No," she says, impatient. "I'm saying that I'm a very intelligent, very attractive woman, and it's only to be expected that, in the absence of you being here to remind them why it's a terrible idea, people have been having _thoughts_ about me."

A smirk flickers across his face at her matter-of-fact tone when she calls herself attractive (not arrogance, just truth), but it doesn't last long.

"Is it?" he asks.

"Yes, it is," she says. "And people can't be held accountable for their thoughts, only their actions. _If_ he feels that way about me, he's never acted on it at all. I would think that sort of behavior should be commended, not punished."

"You think he should be _rewarded_ for thinking about you?" Grant demands, quietly incredulous.

"I think he had the good sense not to make any advances towards me, despite your absence, and should be rewarded with the great gift of continuing through life unmaimed."

He tilts his head, considering.

"Now, see, the problem with _that_," he says, and slowly resumes unbuttoning her shirt. He's using both hands now, and each very deliberate brush against her bare skin is utterly maddening. "Is that it leaves us back where we started, which was him _looking_ at you and believing he can get away with it."

It's so hard to think beyond the pressure of his thigh and the brush of his hands. He's been gone for nearly six months and Jemma has remained faithful, which means it's been nearly six months since she had an orgasm at a hand other than her own. She is, at this point, beyond desperate, and he absolutely knows it.

"He's not allowed to look?" she asks.

"_No one_ is allowed to look," he corrects, and abandons the buttons in favor of pulling her shirt (unbuttoned nearly to her navel, now) open. "Or _think_."

"Or touch?" she supplies. He's just teasing her now, toying with one of her bra straps, and it takes reminding herself that she's trying to save Sunil's life to keep from snapping at him to just get _on_ with it already.

He gets on with it anyway.

Grant watches her face as he palms one breast through her bra and smirks as her breath hitches. She grinds helplessly down on his thigh when he rubs a painfully tight nipple between two fingers, and when he speaks again she can barely even _hear_ him through her desperation, let alone focus on his words.

"Anyone who touches," he says, "I'll tear to pieces. Their deaths will be painful and bloody and very, very slow. And then…" He fists his other hand in her hair, kisses her harshly, and her head is spinning from some combination of lust and lack of oxygen when he finally draws back. "I'll deal with _you_."

The shudder his tone provokes is definitely _not_ from fear, and he grins as he withdraws his hand from her shirt.

"Would you like that?" he asks, cupping her jaw. "Would it turn you on? Seeing me kill Bakshi for touching what's mine?"

"N-no," she stutters, as his other hand falls to her shoulder, thumb digging hard into the sensitive spot above her clavicle. "I don't—I don't want you to kill him."

"No?" he asks.

"No," she repeats, and—remembering his earlier threats—adds, "Or maim."

"No killing or maiming," he muses, and releases her jaw with a sigh. "Now why would I agree to that?"

He's shifting slightly away from threatening towards teasing, and she thinks it's a good sign. He's easing up a bit, showing shades of his usual self.

It's almost certainly time to go on the offensive, but that presents a problem of its own. Namely, the fact that the sort of offensive that usually works on Grant isn't applicable right now. She's learned enough during this encounter to know that _that_ offensive would only make things worse.

But she doesn't know what _would_ work any more than she knows how to defuse his temper when he's in this state.

She can't be positive, the way she usually is. All she can do is take into account what data she has and estimate the best possible solution.

She thinks back to the last time he returned after being away for so long and considers the form the sex they had that day took—the way he drove her to the edge of orgasm again and again for what seemed like hours, but refused to push her over until she was sobbing and begging, and how he then proceeded to make her come over and over again until she lost count—until she begged for him to stop.

She considers their current position, the way he's got her pinned against the counter, and the fact that said position was a direct result of her attempt to pull away from him. She considers the way he kissed her, overwhelming and fierce and holding her in place.

She adds it all together and thinks _ah-ha_. She can't be entirely certain, of course, not with so little data, but she has enough to make an educated guess.

Jemma and Grant have played with control, of course, but it's generally nothing like this. Usually it's more of a game, with give-and-take and playful resistance and roles that switch depending on the day and their relative moods. Still, she's learned the patterns—learned _his_ patterns—and she think she can apply them here, with minor adjustment.

_This_ is much less of a game, but she's nearly positive that this version of Grant is all about control, and she knows exactly how to work _that_.

So she unhooks her fingers from the belt loops of his jeans, then lets them trail along his belt until she reaches the buckle, traces the shape of it as she bites her lip and looks up at him.

"Would you like me to beg?" she offers quietly.

He sees right through it, of course. She knew he would.

"Are you trying to play me, Jemma?" he asks, low and dangerous.

"No," she says. "I'm trying to save my friend's life." She swallows, because the next part is pivotal. If she doesn't get her tone exactly right, if it sounds like a command… "Tell me how to do that. Please. Tell me what I need to do to keep you from hurting him."

"Hmm," he says, and his hands go to her cardigan. He unbuttoned it but never removed it, and it's still solidly on her shoulders.

He slides the sleeves down her arms, hands heavy and warm through the thin fabric of her shirt, and she holds her breath as she moves with him to make it easier to remove it. His touch is slow and deliberate, and his thigh is still pressing against her but not nearly hard enough, and she is going to be _insane_ by the time they actually make it back to their quarters, she just knows it.

"Please," she says again. "Tell me what to do."

"And what _will_ you do?" he asks, letting her cardigan fall to the floor. "Anything?"

"Anything," she promises.

"And if I say Bakshi's life will cost you?" he asks. "If letting him live means I get to kill a dozen other people I've seen looking at you?"

She shrugs, unconcerned, and feels a flash of triumph when his eyes flicker to her breasts. She doesn't know whether it's been six months for him, or whether the assignment he's been on was of the sort that required him to sleep with other women (though she'll get it out of him eventually—later—and then it will be _his_ turn to beg), but it's obvious that he, too, is feeling at least a little desperate.

"Kill them," she says. "I don't care. I can give you names, if you like."

Fitz is away and Sunil will be saved, and the two of them plus Grant account for everyone she cares about in this compound. She's observed how some of the foot soldiers and specialists stare while Grant is away, and she doesn't mind the thought of them suffering for it.

Grant grins. "I love it when you talk like that."

"Is that it, then?" she asks, toying with his belt buckle again. "Will that save him?"

"It's a start."

"And for the rest?" she prompts.

"For the rest…" He cups her face in his hands and gives her the gentlest kiss he's offered today. "For the rest, I'm going to take you home and fuck you until you can't walk."

He punctuates the statement by grinding his thigh against her, and she swears—from frustration as much as anything else, because it's just not _possible_ to get the friction she needs while she's still wearing her jeans.

He laughs. "Should I take that as a yes?"

"Yes," she says at once. "Yes, please, let's go."

"Patience," he chides, and—disappointingly—takes two steps back.

Of course, the sudden distance between them does have a bright side: namely, that she's no longer pinned against the counter and can finally ease away from it. She hisses slightly as she does so; the edge has been digging into her back long enough that she's certain to be bruised tomorrow.

But Grant is looking her over, and the heat in his eyes suggests that her back won't be the only thing bruised today. She bites her lip at the thought, watches the heat in his eyes flare, and makes a mental note to send Sunil some form of thank-you gift, because this is going to be _amazing_.

Grant reaches for her, does up two of the buttons on her shirt—just barely enough to cover her bra—and then nods.

"Leave it like that," he orders.

She glances down, taking in just how much of the skin she usually keeps covered is on display, and frowns. "You want me to walk through the base like this?"

"Yes, I do," he says, and kisses her briefly. "We're gonna walk through the base and I'm gonna make note of every person who looks at you." He lowers his voice, sliding back into the threatening tone from earlier. "Then, later—when I'm done with you—I'll hunt them down and kill them all."

She shivers at the words, and somewhere in the back of her mind she takes a moment to ponder whether she should be concerned that threats of violence arouse her so. Then she decides that the time for concern passed years ago, when she decided to allow a professional killer into not only her bed but her heart, and lets the thought go.

"If that's okay with you," he adds—pleasantly, but with a touch of steel.

Part of her—the part of her which has truly been enjoying his threats and his menace—wants to say _no_, just to see what happens, but her better judgment prevails. The reaction disagreeing might provoke would likely be enjoyable, but at this point she's done with games and ready to return to their quarters so they can get to the actual _sex_ part of the afternoon, thank you.

"Yes," she says. "That's fine."

"Good," he says, and takes her hand. "Then let's go home."

* * *

A/N: *hides*


End file.
